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DC Icons: (#09) Green Lantern (Hal Jordan) by DC Collectibles

Today’s Feature is running a little late, because I just got back from seeing Captain America: Civil War. I want to talk about it, I want to review tons of Marvel figures and bask in all the Marvel greatness, but in a bitter turn of irony, it happens to be DC Friday. That means I’m going to do the right thing and open up another DC Icons figure, this time the Wave 2, Deluxe Green Lantern! Hey, Green Lantern had a movie, didn’t he? Oooooh. Riiiight…

While the style of packaging is the same as the previous Icons releases, Green Lantern is a Deluxe, which means he costs a little more and comes in bigger box with a bunch more stuff. The larger tray has the figure to the right and all his construct parts spread out beside him. It’s an impressive set that boasts 26 pieces. The side panel notes that this version of Hal comes from the Dark Days story arc, which I found very adequate, but not as good as as the preceding stint by Geof Johns. Anyway, considering the number of pieces here, I may actually hold on to this box just to have somewhere to keep all this stuff.

So, obviously Hal sports his New 52 design, which isn’t all that big a break from many of his previous looks. I dig it, but then I didn’t have much of a problem with any of the New 52 costumes. Just about every detail in the costume is actually part of the sculpt from the borders of his green “vest” to the tops of his boots and his Lantern Corps emblem is printed on the raised disk in his chest. And of course, his power ring is sculpted and painted on his finger.

The paint here is overall quite good, with the only exception being an extra dollop of green on his chest to the right of his emblem. I’m not sure if that was added to correct a flaw or just a drip, but it’s worth noting all the same, especially since the paint on this line has been more or less flawless so far. The metallic green looks great and contrasts nicely with the black matte and white gloves.

The portrait is sold enough and probably one of the better ones I’ve seen in this series. If you’ve been reading my Features on this line, you know I’m not overly enamored with the head sculpts. With that having been said, the hair looks good, I like the furled brow, and the mask is part of the sculpt as well as painted. Hal is wearing a rather determined face, which fits the book this figure is pulled from.

Articulation is right in line with what we’ve been seeing in this series. The arms are ball jointed at the shoulders and wrists. The elbows have double hinges, and there are swivels both in the biceps and in the forearms. The legs are ball jointed at the hips, have double hinged knees, and the ankles are hinged and feature lateral rockers. The torso sports a hinge, which is set down by the waist, and there’s a ball joint in the chest. Finally, the neck is ball jointed.

While the base figure is quite good, the real draw here comes from all those extra goodies in the box. For starters, Hal comes with two pairs of hands: One set of fists and one set of grabby hands. He also comes with his Green Lantern battery.

You get one stand-alone construct, which is a giant fist cast in beautiful translucent green plastic. This piece looks fantastic, but is a little problematic. It fits right over Hal’s right hand, but to accommodate his construct armor, his forearms can be un-pegged and the connection is a little weak. If you can’t see where this is going… putting the fist construct on all the way over the fist means that when you pull it off, the arm is going to un-peg and stay stuck in the fist. At this point, it’s frustrating to get it out, so I try not to put it all the way on.

And then you have the full set of construct armor and it is absolutely amazing. It’s all cast in the same translucent green plastic and features boots, upper leg pieces, the arm weapons, shoulder pieces, the torso and helmet harness, and a removable backpack with removable wings. The boots and legs come apart to fully enclose around the legs, the front of the torso is hinged to open, the jetpack is hinged, and the wings on the jetpack are ball jointed.

The fit of the pieces are designed so as not to interfere with the articulation, and that’s quite a clever feat of design. The only thing that’s really lost are the ankle rockers. It’s also impressive how most everything more or less stays put when he’s wearing it. Sometimes I have to re-position the torso piece and sometimes the shoulders will pop off, but otherwise, it fits and stays on really well. The translucent plastic with the figure visible inside creates a beautiful effect and is pretty damn convincing as a ring construct.

Hal is the first Deluxe in the line and as such, he set me back an extra ten bucks, which isn’t a bad deal considering how much is in the box. In fact, I think it’s safe to say that this is my favorite Hal Jordan figure in my collection, and that’s saying something because he’s represented in a fair number of different lines. As a normal release, Hal would have been a perfectly solid and worthwhile figure, but when DC Collectibles threw in that lovely set of armor, they really went above and beyond with this one. I’ve got only one more Icons figure to check out before I’m all up to date and waiting on Wave 3, so next Friday I’ll take a look at Black Adam!

Just wanna say, I don’t know how many other folks follow you amd this website, but I am a huge fan! I appreciate your sense humor and variety in figures. I hope you continue the great work!

With this DC Icons line, I’m just in love with everything. For me, the face sculpts and somewhat limited articulation are issues, but minor ones. So far I’ve collected all of them except GA, Deadman, Mr. Miracle and Luthor. I’ve got Supes and Firestorm on pre-order!

I’ve noticed quite a bit of backlash from other collectors, who keep comparing it to ML and DC’s Universe line (might be mistaken) and I just don’t understand it. To me the blend beautiful sculpts with decent articulation and consistent clean paint applications, all at a reasonable price. Not to mention the unique sculpts; I have not noticed any reused bucks.

I’m definitely a big fan of the Icons line. I think Firestorm is the one I’m looking forward to the most, oh and the Deluxe Batgirl with motorcycle. Pretty cool that they’re going to be doing some accessory packs too!